SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
When you've been so many signature voices for more than 30 years...
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "THE SIMPSONS")
HANK AZARIA: (As Chief Wiggum) All right, people, listen up. The harder you push, the faster we will all get out of here.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "THE SIMPSONS")
AZARIA: (As Moe Szyslak) Amanda Huggenkiss. Hey, I'm looking for Amanda Huggenkiss.
(SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "THE SIMPSONS")
AZARIA: (As Professor Frink) The compression and expansion of the longitudinal waves cause the erratic oscillation - you can see it there...
SIMON: ...Maybe you're tempted to try the Mount Everest of voices.
(SOUNDBITE OF HANK AZARIA AND THE EZ STREET BAND'S PERFORMANCE OF "GLORY DAYS")
HANK AZARIA AND THE EZ STREET BAND: (Singing) Glory days. Well, they'll pass you by. Glory days in the wink of a young girl's eye. Glory days, glory days.
SIMON: But that's really Hank Azaria, the voice behind many characters from the long-running "Simpsons" - also the pharaoh in "Night At The Museum" and Jim Brockmire, the plaid-clad sports announcer. And he's now the presence behind Hank Azaria & The EZ Street Band, a Bruce Springsteen cover band that debuted this past week at Le Poisson Rouge in New York City. The six-time Emmy award-winning actor joins us now from New York. Thanks so much for being with us.
AZARIA: My pleasure. Thanks for having me.
SIMON: Lots of us are Bruce Springsteen in the shower. Why did you want to take it onstage?
AZARIA: Yeah, I was Bruce Springsteen in the shower and a lot on the treadmill. And I, you know, found myself belting them. And, you know, I turned 60, Scott, last April, which I had mixed emotions about. And I thought, well, what would give me some joy? And I thought, maybe I can try to sing some Springsteen songs and surprise people at the party. And I ended up putting together a band, and they're great. And it went so well that we decided - and we had so much fun, we decided, why stop? Let's gig. And that's what we did.
SIMON: Let's listen to a clip of - and I say this with all due respect to you, sir - the real boss singing that bit of "Glory Days."
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "GLORY DAYS")
BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN: (Singing) I had a friend who was a big baseball player back in high school. He could throw that speedball by you, make you look like a fool, boy.
SIMON: Well, I've got to admit he sounds a lot like you.
AZARIA: (Laughter) Pretty sure that was me. Sometimes I get a little confused as to which one - which playback I'm listening to, quite frankly.
SIMON: What do you - and maybe this is impossible to answer - what do you put into the voice? (Imitating Bruce Springsteen) I mean, it's more than just this, right?
AZARIA: (Imitating Bruce Springsteen) Yeah, the gravel is a big part of it. I've been talking like Bruce since I was a teenager because a lot of my imitations came out of hero worship, guys I idolized. (Imitating Al Pacino) Like young Al Pacino, for example, you know, "Dog Day Afternoon" Al or "Godfather" Al.
By the way, (imitating Al Pacino) halfway between young Al Pacino (imitating Bruce Springsteen) and Bruce Springsteen (imitating Moe Szyslak) lives Moe the bartender. That's the exact midline right there.
And (laughter) learning to sing like Bruce really took me a long time. I spent about six to eight months, like, kind of learning to sing and - which I had never taken seriously before. And it's (imitating Bruce Springsteen) hard to sing through that.
And I also found that, you know, Bruce doesn't always sing with that level of rasp. It's more towards the end of the tour, I think, where he gets that level of rasp going. But (imitating Bruce Springsteen) I found that my impression was a little better singing vocally, including that rasp. But that can be kind of hard on the vocal chords.
SIMON: So this is no casual impression, is it? - six to eight months?
AZARIA: You know, I don't ever - vocally, I really don't do anything halfway. I'm a major - I love it. It's my passion. It's kind of my life. So you know what I equate it to? You know how, like, if you tell a hobbyist - if you tell a stamp collector or a guy who likes to paint, you know, tin soldiers or whatever, that's all - you can just do that for six months, they'll be in - like, you and I would want to kind of kill ourselves, but they're in heaven, right? That's how I was with this.
SIMON: I'm making a mental list. Of course, "The Simpsons," "Spamalot" on Broadway, "Night At The Museum," "The Birdcage" and the great Jim Brockmire, inspiration to us all. Where does this project fit into what I'll call - I hope I say it correctly - the Azaria oeuvre?
AZARIA: For me, it's, you know, one of the things I've been most excited about in my whole life. I did not set out to create a tribute band. I set out to make myself smile and have some joy and share a fun thing with my friends and surprise them all. I told no one I was going to do it. And the night of even my birthday, I said, no gifts, but if you like, give to the foundation. We raised, like, $30,000 that night.
SIMON: Mention that if I could. It's the Four Through Nine Foundation.
AZARIA: That's the foundation I started several years ago. We primarily give to education, to social justice and to recovery causes, health and wellness causes. And so then I was like, wait a minute, I love doing this. It went great. Why not tour and do this? I have - doing "Spamalot" was probably the favorite thing I've ever done 'cause I'm a "Monty Python" freak. (Imitating Jim Brockmire) Jim Brockmire was an idea that I had since I was a teenager, and I love doing that. Obviously, "The Simpsons," you know, has been the joy of my life. I put this right up there with all of those. It means that much to me.
(SOUNDBITE OF HANK AZARIA AND THE EZ STREET BAND'S PERFORMANCE OF "GLORY DAYS")
HANK AZARIA AND THE EZ STREET BAND: (Singing) Well, all right (all right). Oh, yeah (oh, yeah).
SIMON: Hank Azaria, thank you very much for speaking with us. I've never been able to interview Bruce Springsteen. The closest I'll ever...
AZARIA: (Imitating Bruce Springsteen) Well, go - ask me anything. Let's just - you know, let's see how it goes. Ask me something.
SIMON: Ha, you've made my day. Hank Azaria is now the frontman for the band Hank Azaria & The EZ Street Band. They're kicking off a concert tour, and next stop is on Long Island. I can't pronounce that - Amagansett.
AZARIA: Amagansett. (Imitating Bruce Springsteen) We'll be at Stephen's Talkhouse in Amagansett August 23. Come on out. We're almost sold out. That's true. True story.
(SOUNDBITE OF BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN SONG, "GLORY DAYS") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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